3. Michael Stipe (R.E.M.)
As the lead singer for R.E.M., Michael Stipe has been a pioneer for the alternative rock genre and has played a part as one of the most influential rock bands of the 1980s and ‘90s. With classic hits like “Losing My Religion,” “It’s The End of the World As We Know It,” “The One I Love,” “Man on the Moon” and “Everybody Hurts,” Stipe’s unique “mumbling” style of singing and his surreal songwriting ability led to R.E.M.’s induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007. Established in Athens, Georgia in 1980, R.E.M.’s debut album Murmur (released in 1983) received critical acclaim, even beating Michael Jackson’s Thriller for Album of the Year in the Rolling Stone Critics Poll. For the next decade, R.E.M. went on to release a string of successful albums with chart topping hits. In 1996, the group signed a reported $80 million recording contract with Warner Bros. Records, the largest of its kind at that point in history. Rumors began swirling about Stipe’s sexuality in response to a hat he wore in 1992 that said “White House Stop AIDS”. At the time Stipe would only comment that he was an “equal opportunity lech” saying he did not call himself gay, straight or bisexual. Finally in 2001, Stipe ended years of speculation by coming out in Time magazine. He divulged that he had been in a three-year relationship with an amazing man and describes himself as a queer artist. Stipe’s stated his reason for waiting so long was that “it was super complicated for me in the ‘80s. I was totally open with the band and my family and my friends and certainly the people I was sleeping with. I thought it was pretty obvious…I’d just never felt strongly enough about a particular relationship to say ‘Yeah, he’s my boyfriend, that is what it is’. Now I recognize that to have public figures be very open about their sexuality helps some kid somewhere out there.”
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